You may be asking yourself why is nextATOM covering the mounting public war between Microsoft and Apple for the personal operating system given that we primarily cover socia
l media on the web. Well I just couldn’t help myself. There has been so much noise between the two tech giants and some pretty good clips – that I had to share them with you. Inevitably, this ever growing and evolving competition for the OS does impact – pretty fundamentally – how our social internet and tech world evolves. That being said, here are some of the blow-by-blow’s over the last few days which culminated earlier today when Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer went on The Today Show to introduce the new OS (clip below):
Much of the noise around the Windows 7 launch began with a public empowering campaign showing how each user had input into the new OS – which looks to be a great step forward for Microsoft from their last OS releases – Vista. Microsoft even took some hints from the social economy players by promoting “Launch Parties” for the Windows 7 event (see below):
All in all, this was a pretty good move by Microsoft to start building the “grassroots” interest around the launch. Unfortunetly, Microsoft really didn’t attempt to push any compelling social media efforts to build interest. Something like the Paramount Pictures launch of 
Paranormal Activity’ could have played nicely with the private launch party theme. That said, they did have some interesting – and funny – advertising campaigns. One that I enjoyed was the Burger King poster promotion Microsoft did in Japan for the launch (or lunch) date.
Where has Apple been during all this comotion? In addition to battling a joint effort between Google, Motorola and Verzion directly attacking their iPhone – Apple also had to prepare to fire back at all of Microsoft’s buzz. So what did they do? They went back to the well again for their ever popular – and beginning to get annoying – Mac v. PC ads. Reminiscing of all the less-than successful Microsoft OS releases in the past – Apple makes the ‘we’ll believe it when we see it’ statement (see below).
All this bantering aside, it looks like Microsoft has actually delivered on a truly competitive OS to Apple’s. While its not interesting enough for me to switch back to the PC world (left it after the release of Vista) – it is interesting enough for me to give it a Bootcamp try.
How long do you think it will take before both Microsoft and Apple begin integrating social applications and platforms into their OS? Facebook, MySpace and Twitter on the command line. What do you think?
Oh yeah, don’t forget about the Family Guy episode on November 8th for a Windows 7 primetime animated sitcom for the launch – still can’t believe how much Seth MacFarlane sold out on that one.
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